Friday, March 23, 2012

Clintonville Booms

I usually don't link to these guys, well, ever, but they've covering a story that sounds interesting--the Wisconsin booms:

Loud booming noises have shattered the air and rattled the ground in parts of the town, wrenching many residents out of their sleep. And no amount of investigation has determined the cause, city administrator Lisa Kuss said in a telephone interview.”

Of course the Jones gang is skeptical of yesterday's USGS announcement that a swarm of small earthqaukes, 1.5 magnitude, caused the noises, case closed, nothing to see, move on. Problem is, the sounds were occurring before the measured quakes:

Indeed, the Wisconsin Rapids Tribune reports that residents have been feeling the booms for months, noting that, “Several residents questioned the solution. After all, earlier that week they were told earthquakes had been ruled out as a potential cause of the sounds that shook them awake for several nights.”

Not to say micro quakes aren't the cause--they may be--it just seems odd the USGS would not show any quakes then suddenly find a swarm of tiny ones near Clintonville, solving the mystery. Small earthquakes aren't normally felt. But what else could it be?

Well, there are no railroad lines in Clintonville. There is a small airport but it's an unlikely source since small jets have been known to visit there without previous complaints. Obviously fracking comes to mind, the cause du jour for all recent mysteries, but..

No one seems to know what the mysterious booms in Clintonville are, which means runaway speculation is about to begin. City officials have checked and rechecked methane levels at the local landfill, monitored water, sewer and gas lines, contacted the military about any exercises in the area, reviewed mining explosive permits and inspected the Pigeon River dam next to city hall.

I'm stumped. Alex Jones obviously believes the earthquake explanation is a little too convenient--me, too--although he probably thinks it's an underground FEMA camp being constructed. If you watch the geologist on the linked video he says a possibility could be the low water table (lack of snow this winter) causing the granite subsurface to 'settle', which perhaps could explain the small earthquakes. It has been a very warm winter across most of the US, so perhaps we're experiencing some new geologic effects we've not seen before.

Whatever the case it shows how much mankind knows about our environment. These USGS guys are probably just guessing. Yet we've been told to implicitly trust climate forecasts out to 100 years.